Retired Military

Hello GT staff & members. I've been a member for five years or more and absolutely love this site. I was injured during my tour of duty to Afghanistan and returned from the desert in 2013. Another injured sailor that I met during my tenure in a two year medical hold status turned me on to guitar. I've messed with the guitar since then and not really getting anywhere. Playing the guitar is like therapy for me and I've always wanted the learning curve to go much faster but it didn't mainly because of a hurry mindset. I've recently decided to take it nice and slow and really get better and it's working. I live just outside the Jacksonville, Florida area and I balance my therapy between fishing and playing guitar. I have an Epiphone acoustic, a Gibson Les Paul tribute and I just purchased a Fender Stratocaster and a Fender 68 Custom Deluxe Reverb Amp. So now my tool-box is looking good and I just need to get busy. Keep on Rockin...

Hang in there brother. Played guitar way back when. Was really a "banger" (chords and rhythyms) more than anything. While in Iraq in 2004 I took it back up again playing with the young guys. Now that I'm retired, like you, I've taken it back up, but more seriously into leads and scales. Somthing I've always wanted to learn. At 65 y/o it's a slow process, but, as you say, it's theraputic.

Welcome mluvs2fish,

First of all Thank you for your service to our country! Your tale of guitar as theraphy is spot on. Guitar is a great place to find strength, solace, determination, and even meaning in the day to day.

Your observations, about being in a hurry and not getting anywhere, are also spot on! That is the experience of most people when they take up the insturment. It is not an easy row to hoe. This web page is constantly filled with people complaining that they have been playing to 2 to 12 months and they are not a virtuoso yet. It it my belife that this impatient point of view is the largest obstruction to ever becomming a master of their instrument.

Your observation about "taking it nice and slow and really get better" could be the most important lesson you will learn about guitar. You will return to this lesson again and again as you deal with navigating the plateaus of learning guitar. You are approaching a skill that demands years of consistant practice to get really good. You wouldn't expect a newbe to survive a NFL football scrimish.... would you? Yet people get impatient with learning the guitar.

Make no mistake about the two, seemingly divergent paths, they are more alike than most people realize. The biggest diffrence is that Football and guitar work on diffrent muscle sets. Guitar is focused mostly on miniscule muscular movements of your upper body, where football works on mass movements of the entire body. This perspective may seem to make learning guitar much easier, but that is misleading. In guitar you are working on micro-muscular movements, which does not bash up your body like being tackled does. However training those small muscles to reliable master the intracate moves required, is physically as complicated as learning to run, or throw and catch a ball... (if not more so, since you can continue to learn guitar long into your elder years)

Hold fast to your plan to "take it slow and get really better"!! That kind of thinking will serve you well, through out your musical life, as you explore the mastery of the guitar. You cant really force you muscles to do this stuff, you have to train them to do things they never would have attempted otherwise. THIS IS HARD! The fact is...Slow and steady wins this race, hands down. Congradulations on realizing the importance of patience in learning guitar. Welcome to the astonishing world of musicianship! ENJOY THE RIDE.....

Welcome aboard and thank you both for your military service. Good luck on your journeys. [br][br]

Snojones that had to be the most well thought out analysis of the guitar learning process I've ever heard or read. I wholeheartedly agree with all of it and love the football analogy too. [br][br]

It really is strange how people take up hobbies like golf, tennis or bowling and play them for years never ever expecting to become pros, just enjoying them for what they are, yet as soon as they take up an instrument the thinking and expectations change. I'm just as guilty of it as well. This really is a HARD thing to do and it's a lifelong journey. I think that's what I really like about it. I'll never get bored. There's always another song or lick or style to learn. [br][br]

I know you wrote that to the op, but I think all of us can take something from that. [br][br]

Moe

Most importantly, thank you for your service to our country. I wish you every possible success in your guitar learning journey. Please keep us posted on your progress.

And I also have to say with your Epi acoustic, the Les Paul and the Strat and the Fender Custom Deluxe Reverb your tool box is looking good!

Hi

Ex Royal Marine Commando of 27 years. Served alongside US Marines in various places and with US Rangers in Northern Iraq in 1992 - fine fellows. Nice to see I am not the only "vet" going back to the guitar later in life. As a young guy strummed a bit but on joining military gave it up. Now just about to retire from the rat race (66) and have started from scratch with Guitar Tricks - have the time (and determination) to do it right this time. Really enjoying it and it allows some valuable me time from day to day mundanity of life.

Nice to meet you - have a great guitar journey

Rob Wallace